FANTASY BOOKS WORTH THE PAGE COUNT ~ long book recs 

If I see a book under 600 pages I'm immediately displeased.

I fall into the category of "people who would never had read and enjoyed Winnowing Flame but for Elle's channel." We are an elite category of readers.

I just have to point out that the Liveship Traders trilogy is actually Books 4, 5, and 6 of a 16-book series. And I would say the entire 16 books are WORTH THE READ. I do love that you highlighted Liveship, though... most Hobb fans are obsessed with Fitz (& I do love him) but this trilogy is SPECIAL. ♥ But please gods don't read them out of order 😅😅

Jade Legacy! A span of 30 years covered in about 700 pages. I really enjoyed the first two books in the series but I was pretty doubtful going in to Legacy, just because I couldn't see how Lee would pull off covering 3 decades in a satisfactory way.....but she did. She really did and more than a year later I'm still in awe.

First off, that dog is cute AF. Secondly I think the main reason Sandersons books are worth the page count is that his ending are great and he sets them up beautifully throughout the novel. Can't get those endings without all the pages. Thirdly I would say a song of ice and fire. The page count is definitely worth it for the careful reading who takes the time to read between the lines and get to what's beneath the surface.

Blood Song is sooooo good. I love the book and the entire series.

I read Blood Song earlier this year and it's one of my favorites I've read in 2023. I like how even smaller plot points are used later in the book, such as when they would throw daggers at boards (trading them as currency) and then using those skills later in life. Or when Vaelin got his dog and then the dog was pivotal to a story moment later in the book.

For me both Priory of the Orange tree and A Day of Fallen Night by Samantha Shannon are long books that earn their length

It's been a few years since I've read it, but the Kushiel's Legacy series (made up of 3 trilogies) by Jacqueline Carey is full of chunky books that I didn't want to end. The very first book covered a longer period of time so it was a bit slow and the final series was less epic, but so much happens that the page counts fly by.

China Miéville - Perdido Street Station and The Scar (his second and third books). They're both long, both phenomenal! Two of the best modern fantasty books I've ever read. Cannot recommend enough - 10/10.

Ive been looking for more books an this video just gave me like 10 new nooks to try. Thank you!

Great reviews. You are becoming my go to reviewer when I am looking for something new to read.

Blood Song and Tower Lord are two of the best books all time!

I just bought Shadow of the Gods at my local bookstore on Friday :) and finally started to read it last night. It's very good and when I saw the thumbnail. I'm taking it as a sign that I must read this series :) I have heard nothing but good things about John Gywnne and especially his Faithful and the Fallen series :) thank you for sharing this!

I needed twenty minutes of calm today, and your video fit the bill. ❤

From the way you have described and mentioned these books in your other videos, these were the ones which I had added to my tbr list. I have started reading shadow of Gods since some time abd it's easily going to be one of my favorites; so thank you for always recommending such very good stuff and making these videos. Ps: I don't know if you have ever heard of the name but i would suggest "The wandering inn" . It's a web novel and till what I have read from my personal pov it's easily my favorite thing I have ever read. Though it's too long and still continuing, I just read one chapter one day like one does with web novel and story will still feel very satisfying. It is very much appreciated by people who know about it but I still think more people need to talk about it as it's criminally underrated. It's like slice of life sprinkled with magic, emotional intensity, and sometimes becomes very grim. It's about a modern girl ending up in a world which is like a medieval fantasy video game type. Give it a try, just few chapters. It's available for free online on its website. The writing is so accessible but also some parts are very beautifully written and characters are so diverse, fascinating. All i can say it's very enjoyable, fun experience.

Tigana is a stand-alone by Guy Gavriel Kay; beautifully written and pretty big Sword, Memory and Thorn is a very long trilogy, with ‘To Green Angel Tower’ being an absolute monster; Tad Williams at his best in my opinion American Gods is another great long read; Neil Gaiman stretching himself here with amazing results Lion of Macedon/Dark Prince - heroic fantasy of the best kind by the mighty David Gemmell (R.I.P) Nice idea

The Winnowing Flame trilogy seems like a cool fantasy retelling of Mass Effect.

I would add the sword of Kaigen

I just started Mistborn era 2, and I'm about halfway through The Alloy of Law. I was nervous going in because people shit on Wax & Wayne quite a bit, but I love this buddy duo. Having a great time! For another recommendation, I loved Mark Lawrence's The Book that Wouldn't Burn. I found myself constantly surprised at how much action and information he was packing into it that even for a 600 page book, it doesn't have that problem of "yeah, yeah, yeah, get on with it" that a lot of books I've read this year have had.

I loved Engines of Empire (haven't yet read the sequel) and the Bloodsworn series. I can't wait to continue them!!

The Grace of Kings is the best fantasy book I have read this year. So great. I am also always happy when I see Queens of Innis Lear recommended!

I read Blood Song in just a few days and was hooked. Read Tower Lord and loved that one too. Super excited to read Queen of Fire

I just HAVE to say that Liveship Traders was spectacular beginning to end!!!! 🎉😂

I would also say Memory,sorrow and thorn, it's slow paced at some times but it's so worth it i got throught like 400 pages in a day

❤️📚📚❤️ Loved this video...thank you!!!

Many of the books you speak about I find most enjoyable. You do good work. I've loved the Fantasy genre for decades. :)

I started the Winnowing Flame series yesterday based on your recommendation and it's absolutely riveting, the world and characters and species and history all feel unique, and there has yet to be a slow or uninteresting chapter. Great pacing. Great recommendation for adult epic fantasy that is dark but not grimdark.

I'd highly recommend the Echoes of Fate! Fantastic completed fantasy series, with other books coming out exploring more of the world and characters backstories!

I've just started book 2 of malazan. I hope I can sit back when I've finished it and say it was worth it 🤞😂

The dandelion dynasty ❤❤. I knew you would talk about this one!! Been looking for this for ages. I kept calling it the daffodil dynasty 🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️. Been driving me mad lol😂. Thanks soooooo much. Xx

Very good recommendations, I have added two of them to my neverending backlog. I would add the works of Guy Gavriel K to the list. For anyone who likes big fantasy books with adult theming and very well realised worlds and characters.

TH White,The Once and Future King. The first book is admittedly YA but the later books are absolutely stunning, tragic and everything you’d want a retelling of the Arthurian epic to be. I also think China.Mieville’s Bas Lag trilogy doesn’t get anywhere near enough love, there are passages from all three books that are so perfectly written they will always stay with me…. I enjoyed this, it’s great to hear about work (well aside from Sanderson and Hobb) that’s not on everybody else’s lists, and you give a good account of what kind of readers each would appeal to.

Peter A Flannery Battle Mage. A big stand alone fantasy worth everyone of its 648 pages. 4.45 rating from just under 9000 reviews on Goodreads.

I started reading The Winnowing Flame trilogy like a few months ago after I watched your review on the series! And I actually enjoyed it so much, even though the second book is a bit draggy and so many information being put out that I needed to comprehend. Now I'm already on the third/final book and I'm so sad to finish this series🥲 What a rollercoaster ride of emotions these books are! P.s. Helcate is just so precious😭

OMGoodness! I loved them, but I bawled my eyes at the end!!! 🥺😞☹️😖😫😢😭

Best book tuber on the internet.

Anthony Ryan let's gooooooooo ❤

I really liked both John Gwynne Series I have read. I have read The Faithful and the Fallen Series and The Bloodsworn Saga Series. Also, You Might like Brian Durfee's The Five Warior Angel Series which I liked very well.... Thank you for the video.

She Who Rides the Storm. I haven't finished it yet. It's a 'longish' high/epic fantasy that is about 600 pages. I'm falling head over heels for it, so far. If it keeps doing what it's been I'm going to be over the moon. Great characters, a revenge quest, a heist, and compulsively readable.

I’ve just started the video but for me the series that like you say you don’t realise you’ve read so much is ASOIAF, obviously incredibly popular but I read the second book, Clash, in 2 days and it’s a little over 800 pages long

Thank You for BLOOD OATH,,,,,,,,,started yesterday....can"t put it down.....

Empire of the Vampire is chunky but so so good!!! The Bound and the Broken Series by Ryan Cahill, the books get longer as the series moves forward with novellas in between!!! Empire of Silence and the Sun Eater series is great!!!! Green Bone Saga and Red Rising series are also long but great!

So not recommendations, but specifically the last series you spoke about. I 1000% agree it is worth the page count. I read the authors first published book as the first book of his I touched. It took a bit of time to get into it for me, to get used to his writing, then I went to another of his older standalones, this one I ate up a bit faster. Finally I tried the trilogy he is known for and devoured it. I then sat and stared at the series you mentioned on my shelf for about a year before I cracked them open. 3853 pages and 3 days later I ordered the 4th book.

Just bought two of these. RIP to my 2024 TBR 😅

Have you read Magician by Raymond E Feist? I enjoyed the trilogy. Going to work my way through the rest in the series.

Omg that’s such a beautiful library!

A favorite series of mine is The Faithful and The Fallen by John Gwynne. It’s a 4 book series and I’d be hard pressed to call out a single book of the series as a favorite. For me, it was one of those books/series where I hated to see the end coming as I was so engrossed in the story and the characters. Loved the main characters and hated the villain characters. Loved the dIchotomy between them. Need to read more by Gwynne. Loooking forward to The Hunger of the Gods.

Loved the Robin Hobb trilogy, Live Ships

Loved Malice by John Gwynne - just about finished Valour

I'd love to hear your thoughts on Name of the Wind

Great Video!

Where is my man Steven Erikson and his Malazan Empire? The absolute pinnacle of adult-fantasy with a long page count 🥲

In November or December I intend to read The Queens of Innis Lear since I read King Lear last year around the same time.

I did a "year of Sanderson" and read only his books (including secret projects) to use this time to get caught up on his collection. Now being late October and the final secret project done, I'm excited for January to get to some non-Sanderson fantasy!

I'm so interested to see what you thought of Robin Hobb's Rainwilds if you didn't like the ending of Liveships? I happen to agree, but I think that it sets up the final instalment so well. I actually was recommended to read Liveships and then I read Rainwilds, and THEN went back to the first trilogy which was honestly a bit of a let down and doesn't add much to the world building of the second two series. Love to know your thoughts!!

I just finished Grace of Kings recently, after over a year of picking it up and putting it down. I really wanted to like it as everyone talks about how great it is. It was good, but just didn't hit me until like 75% into the book. I then tried to get into book 2 and just could not do it. Maybe I will try again one day. Looking forward to re-reading Blood Song though, been ages since I finished that one. Though I am trying to get my wife into the Cosmere, and bought her books 1-4 of Stormlight for Christmas. We will read those first I think :)

What version of grace of kings is that? I really like the edged page color

R. Scott Bakker , The Second Apocalypse series.

I usually like your recommendations - but not the Winnowing Flame - I slugged through the first two books and DNF the third book even though I own it. It's not as exciting as I thought it would be :( the premise was interesting, but it was definitely not a page turner for me.

The “Spellmonger” series by Terry Mancour is definitely this type.

I ordered Engines of empire /chaos,not found them in the library here in Belgium.

Joe Abercrombie , First Law series.

Great video, Ell. I agree with Gwynne's Bloodsworn Saga. It's fast-paced and doesn't have any unnecessary filler material. Sanderson's Mistborn Eras 1 and 2 both probably fit this moniker as well. I have to disagree with Grace of Kings being under this caption, but I DNF'd it after Chapter 2 felt like just an irrelevant lore dump, so I may be biased. I'm reading Ninth Rain next month. Excited to see if that book/series hits the mark or not.

For some reason I tend to get bored when any book takes place on any sort of boat or ship but almost every one of my favorite fantasy series end up spending a good chunk of time on the water. The Gentleman Bastards immediately became a top series for me and the whole 2nd book is a pirate book lol.

Where did you get that edition of Grace of Kings from?

I read the Wionnowing Trilogy because of you I liked it might have loved it at times. I just think book three was disappointing. The loose ends weren't tied up well in my opinion.

This was a timely topic for me in particular. I know it was 5 months ago, but I was literally just doing some research on novel length and trying to get a better feel for what's "acceptable" and what people are willing to invest their time into. It sounded like all of these books were from already established authors. Seems that a debut novel that's as long as some of these might not be as amenable to people who don't already know the author. But, do you have any thoughts on that? Have you ever picked up a chonky debut and been pleasantly surprised?

Where did you find the Jen Williams books in hard cover? everywhere i look its only in pb.

600 pages in one day!? Impressive!

Have yah tried The Wandering Inn?

Your take on the liveship traders series is the exact opposite of mine. I struggled to read "ship of magic". Had to put it away for a few years and come back to it and finally finished it. The second and third books, i thought were better. The other trilogies in the series were far better in my opinion

Maybe I will try Shadow of the Gods. I tried reading Faithful and the Fallen and had to quit after a book and a half. Worst written books I have ever tried to read.

When I read _In the Shadow of the Gods_ (and book two which I can't be bothered to remember its name) I felt the reasonably well drawn characters where walking across a whiteboard, the world construct and its internal logic were thin.

I REALLY want to read Hobbs but I keep hearing not so great things about the endings of her series…I heard it’s all just so sad lol 😢

funny you mention liveship traders trilogy because i couldnt get through the first book of farseer trilogy 😅😅

Long books intimidate me so bad 🥹🫠

Someone, please read the Crimson Empire series by Alex Marshall…these books need to be on everyone’s list!

🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥

Noooo I'm halfway through The Mad Ship and now im scared 😂

BLOOD SONG

I could not get into Shadow of the Gods. It has all the makings of books I would normally really love but I just couldn't connect to any of the characters. Maybe I DNFd it too early but they all felt very one dimensional to me, ugh viking ugh, type feeling.

I made it through the Stormlight Trilogy and yes, I was able to make it through but I was glad it was over. I thought that they really needed a good edit as there was, imo, way too much fluff and what I called “side quests” that felt completely unnecessary. I was unimpressed by the ongoing inclusion of new characters who had an interesting story but had very little to do with driving the whole story forward. I confess that I started skipping entire chapters because I just didn’t want to know. I know that others would vehemently disagree but it seemed self-indulgent on the part of Sanderson to include many of those “side quests” and about a third of the way through book 2 I lost patience and started skipping them. It didn’t adversely impact my understanding so apparently they weren’t truly needed. LOL

Your videos would benefit from chapters.

I heard one piece and wheel of time are pretty short reads

Not a ton of plot in Ship of Magic? The best books use plot to explore characters. I.e. often the plot is secondary.

Robin Hobb has a way of writing one book too many per story arc. Like the Soldier Son Trilogy could do without Forest Mage.

Imajica by Clive Barker anyone??

Did shadow of the gods really need the overly detailed descriptions of a person's gear, and the taking on and off of said gear so often? Did I need to get a fairly detailed description of what a 1-off character(shopkeep in early Varg chapter for example) looked like but barely any mentions of the 3 main characters look like? Pretty sure at one point someone(maybe Orca) takes their armor off over their head and Gwyn writes how it was uncomfortable going over their ears among other details and this happens multiple times sometimes in the same chapter. The beginning 3rd of the 1st book was a bit of a slog for no good reason. Wasn't a slog in a slow burn getting us to know the world kinda way.

If I get those books they would have to be paperback or ebook.

Kind of surprised at no A Song of Ice And Fire. Also Evan Winters' (as yet unfinished) The Burning series. Im a legendarily slow reader as I basically only read when I don't have access to a computer or I'm extremely burnt out of computers, ASoIaF took me a good 9-10 months to read (despite still being my favourite books ever), I've been reading Wheel of Time for 6 months and I'm only halfway through book 4 and even what I would call a "light" series like Harry Potter can take me 6-8 weeks, but I got through Rage of Dragons and The Fires of Vengeance (books 1&2 of the series) in just a few days, and they're pretty chonky books.

The Wheel of Time, A Song of Ice and Fire, The Kingkiller Chronicles.

Liveship Traders trilogy is NOT drastically different to the Farseer trilogy! Some of us DON’T think the first (or any of the other books) are too slow or need ‘trimming’. Young lady, wash your mouth out with soap! I will NEVER have a word said against Fitz or Robin Hobb! She, along with Joe Abercrombie, Anthony Ryan and John Gwynne are gods in the fantasy genre! I’d fight you on that! ♥️

300 page fantasy doesn't get any better than David Gemmell. RiP

Wheel of Time, Lord of the Rings

Tolkien Feist Donaldson GRRM

why is tress here thats not a long book

Rambling city

You wouldnt trust a skinny chef, dont trust a short fantasy book.

Not one single video without mentioning Sanderson... meh